


Holy Holy

by rosymamacita



Series: Drop Ship Camp [4]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anya's peace talks worked, F/M, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff, Season 1, grounder village, grounders made them do it, spring fertility festival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-17
Updated: 2016-02-17
Packaged: 2018-05-21 05:03:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6039262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosymamacita/pseuds/rosymamacita
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The peace talks with Anya on the bridge worked, and the Ark hasn’t come down to Earth yet. Bellamy and Clarke are busy making alliances with the grounders, but a misunderstanding about a village ceremony forces them to face some truths about how they feel about each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holy Holy

Clarke and Bellamy sat awkwardly in the cabin the Rivakru had provided them. He was at the table, sitting on one of the two chairs, resting from their hike through the woods. Clarke sat on the edge of the bed. There was only one bed. It was the first time they’d be sharing a sleeping place, and it shouldn’t matter. The delinquents shared sleeping quarters all the time.

“Why do we both have to be here again?” Bellamy scowled at her.

Clarke scowled back at him for a second. They had developed a partnership that she was surprised to find was actually very successful, but that didn’t mean that they agreed about everything, or even got along. Bellamy could be a prickly bastard.

“Because we’re a team, remember?” her tone dripping with sticky sweet condescension. She recognized that she was also not the easiest to get along with.

“Thanks for the update, princess,” he sassed back. She ducked her head to hide her smile. “What I meant was why we BOTH have to be here. If we’re a team, then one of us should be enough to represent The Sky People in this village ceremony. I mean, it’s just a formality. We’ve already made the negotiations.”

Clarke shrugged. “I don’t know. Anya said it’s something about Rivakru being a “teina” village and it has to be two co-leaders, and they both have to be here if we want our clan to be accepted. She was very clear about us both having to be here. You want access to the river, don’t you?”

“Of course I do. And I want us to learn how to fish like them and use those boats like they do.” Bellamy sighed and shook his head. “Why do all these villages have to have so many different rules?”

“I don’t know, The Ark only had one set of rules, how did that work out?”

Bellamy shot her a sharp look. “Funny,” he said. “Fine. I’ll give them a shot. We’ll figure out whatever strange traditions they have—“

“Bellamy…” They’d talked about him not assuming the grounders traditions were stupid. He just didn’t believe in their superstitions. She didn’t either, but the Rivakru did, and it was the grounder world that they were trying to adjust to.

“— And treat them respectfully,” Bellamy finished, shooting her another side eye. “I mean, fine, I understand, there’s a long history of people celebrating the return of the sun and fertility and spring and the reawakening of the Earth. I get it.”

Clarke looked down at her hands in her lap, smiling. He’d already told her all about all the ancient gods people use to believe in, and how they used to think that their celebrations somehow had some say in whether or not spring would come again. He had gone on and on. It had been a long trek through the woods.

“Don’t you think it’s kind of cool that we get to share in their rites of spring? I mean their world down here on the ground was so different from ours up on The Ark.”

“Clarke, your world up on The Ark was so different from my world up on The Ark.”

Clarke pressed her lips together, and stood up, turning to her pack. She took out the clothes they had brought and started laying them out on the bed, pointedly ignoring him.

After a few moments, Bellamy slammed his hands down on the table top and stood up. “What?”

“I can’t help where I come from, Bellamy. I know I was privileged, that my mom was on the council and I was never hungry or on low oxygen, but my dad got floated the same as your mom. I was locked up alone for a year with no one but my own imagination to keep me company. I had to suffer with the knowledge that my best friend and those who I thought were my protectors betrayed me. It didn’t even matter that I was privileged, Bellamy. You and I both know that there was nothing just or fair about The Ark, and now here we are, both of us together, and we have the chance to change things, to do it right. To start over.”

“And this starting over has to mean that the two of us stay the overnight in a strange village without even a pistol to protect ourselves? Where any warrior could cut us down with a sword or club or strangle us in our sleep?”

“Bellamy, Rivakru is a fishing village. It’s a place where people can come to meet in peace. It’s not a warrior village. We can’t come in here waving guns. We have to show we want peace. We have to make concessions.”

“You make too many concessions. We’re vulnerable.”

Suddenly Clarke realize how close they had moved together, how intently they were staring into each others eyes. Bellamy glared down at her. He seemed taller this close. Wider, too.

A bell sounded somewhere in the village.

“That’s the first bell,” Clarke said. “Anya said it means we have to get ready. We have to put on our fancy clothes now, before the second bell. The second bell is when we have to walk through the village down to the meeting hall.”

Bellamy glared at her in the small dark room.

“Anya told me.”

“Oh Anya is just a fountain of wisdom,” he said. “She’s your best friend ever since you made that treaty.”

Clarke pressed her lips together. “We made the treaty, Bellamy. You were there. What is with you?”

He took a deep breath and tossed his pack down onto the bed next to hers. “This is ridiculous. What do we need with fancy clothes living on the ground? We’ll just get muddy or bloody or ripped in a few minutes anyway. And festivals with strangers? I don’t know. Something just feels wrong. Why couldn’t we bring anyone else? I’m suspicious.”

“Anya said that it is a holy festival, and is taken very seriously, and only the leaders can attend. It’s like some sort of spiritual ceremony or something.”

He shook his head grimly and turned to his pack, pulling out the clothes they had taken from a bunker and stitched together into something resembling fancy. That had been a big surprise. Octavia had taken Clarke’s plain robe to tailor it into a dress for her and Bellamy had embroidered it with beautiful designs representing the Sky People. Their mother had taught them how on the Ark. Clarke picked her dress up from where she had laid it on the bed. It was made out of some shimmering blue/purple pre cataclysm fabric and tied with a black sash, both decorated with gold stars. When she looked at the dress, she had a hard time being mad at him.

She looked up at Bellamy, wanting to thank him again, but he was undressing, his shirt already off.

“You just going to stand there and stare at it?”

Clarke startled before she realized he was talking about the dress. “It’s beautiful,” she said, feeing a little shaky. “I just wanted to thank you again.”

Bellamy drew his eyebrows together and shook his head awkwardly. “It’s nothing. It’s for our people. For the ceremony. Just put it on so we can get this over with.”

“Uh… there’s nowhere to change…” she said and felt stupid. She knew that was another difference between the way they grew up. Alpha station was simply much more modest than the lower stations. That was why seeing him shirtless always threw her composure.

“Clarke,” he said. “Come on, you’re a medic, you shouldn’t care…” he started then sighed. “I’ll turn around, okay? I won’t watch.” And then he did just that. She couldn’t believe that he didn’t mock her for her silliness. She rushed to put her outfit on. When she finally turned around, he was all dressed.

“You can turn around now,” she told him. He wore all black. Heavy black pants that weren’t that much different than his normal pants, but fit much more closely, and a soft, thin, black, buttoned shirt with the same embroidered stars as hers, but only on the shoulders and cuffs. The collar fell open at his neck and she found herself staring again.

“Wow,” he said, his eyes running up and down her figure. She felt a shiver run down her back. He cleared his throat. “They won’t know what hit them.”

“Same to you,” Clarke said, finding herself at a loss for words.

Luckily the second bell chimed then and she didn’t have to figure out what to say. He turned and held out an arm to her. She took it and they left the cabin.

The first person they met in the village was Indra, a delegate from Trikru, who stopped, stock still in front of their cabin and stared at them both.

“Indra,” Bellamy greeted her.

“Forgive me,” Indra said, her eyes shifting back and forth between Bellamy and Clarke. “I was not aware that the two of you were together.”

Clarke frowned. “What? What are you talking about?”

“I had always been under the impression that you were simply co leaders.”

“We are. I’m happy to meet your co leader,” Clarke indicated the tall slender man behind Indra.

Indra looked at her strangely. “He is not my co-leader. He is my mate.”

“I’m sorry. I thought teina ceremonies were for co leaders.”

“Who told you that?” Indra asked.

Clarke looked at Bellamy then, his brows drawn together in confusion.

“Anya,” Clarke said.

Indra’s eyebrows shot up. She looked back and forth between Clarke and Bellamy again. And then she threw back her head and laughed.

Clarke stepped closer to Bellamy. Indra laughing scared the hell out of her.

“What is so funny?” Bellamy demanded angrily.

Indra tamed her laughter and looked at them, her eyes twinkling and her smile wide and beautiful in a sight that was truly terrifying to behold. “Anya has a glorious sense of humor.”

“Anya is humorless,” Clarke said, her voice flat.

Indra chuckled and leaned forward to whisper in Clarke’s ear. “Teina does not mean partner/co-leader. It means partner/lover.”

Clarke’s jaw dropped open. She watched Indra take her lover’s arm and saunter off to the meetinghouse. “Enjoy the wine!” Indra called over her shoulder.

“What?” Bellamy said, grabbing her elbow and turning her to look at him. “What is it?? What did she say to you? You’re white as a ghost.”

“We-we-we have to leave, Bellamy. We can’t be here.”

“We can’t leave. You were right. We need this alliance. We need the river and we need to learn from them. They are one of the closest villages. We have to be here. I was just being pissy because I knew you would make me stay anyway.”

Clarke looked at Bellamy and her eyes widened. “The rites of spring, Bellamy. What is that usually about?”

He snorted. “Spring? The sun coming back, the end of winter, flowers coming back, baby bunnies, eggs, rebirth, fertility, you know. Spring.”

“Bellamy,” she said, and felt like she was going to cry. “This isn’t a negotiation or a power thing. It’s a fertility rite. Teina doesn’t mean coleaders. It means lovers.”

He stared at her. “But Anya said…”

She sighed, and her sigh was far too shaky for her peace of mind. “Anya was fucking with us.”

His mouth fell open as he realized what she meant. His eyes darkened and she felt his heart speed up. She realized she was clutching onto him, as if for safety. She dropped her hands and stepped back.

He was shaking his head. “No. I’m sorry Clarke. I’m sorry. We don’t have to do this. I’ll get you out of here. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing to me?” she snapped. She wasn’t sure why she snapped.

His breath left him in a huff and he raked his hand through his hair, ruining the careful way he had combed it for the ceremony. “Because I wouldn’t make you…Do you think we’d have to…?”

“We can’t leave, Bellamy. We have to see it through. We need this village. We’re just going to have to…”

“I wouldn’t make you do anything you don’t want to do,” he said. He was looking at her with such concern. It was all about her, and how she felt. She suddenly realized, it wasn’t something she didn’t want to do.

The thought brought heat to her cheeks. She wasn’t blind. She was aware how handsome Bellamy was. And she cared for him. She trusted him. The thought of “practicing fertility rites” with him made her mouth water. She swallowed.

“Listen, Bellamy.” She ran her hands down her dress, nervously. His eyes followed. “It doesn’t have to mean anything. I remember how you were when we first got to Earth. I know you are okay with casual sex.”

She saw his fingers twitch as if he wanted to reach for her. He cleared his throat. “But you aren’t,” he said. It was a statement.

The drop ship camp was a small place, and everyone knew everything that happened. He knew that the only person she’d been with down on Earth had been Finn, and it had messed her up when it went to hell. She didn’t know if he knew Finn was the only person she’d been with, ever. The fuck if she’d ever tell him.

She huffed out a breath and squared her shoulders. “I am okay with having sex with you, Bellamy. I will do what I have to.”

She saw him wince. Perhaps she hadn’t said that right. “I want to.”

He cocked his head at her, as if he didn’t believe her.

It pissed her off suddenly. “Well if you don’t want to, forget it. We’ll just bow out. Screw the alliance.”

“No,” he said, and grabbed her arm. “I’ll be okay,” he grinned and god that grin made her lose her breath. “As long as you are.”

He was standing close to her again, dressed in that black shirt, with that crazy curly hair and those freckles. She had to laugh and admit the truth, at least to herself. She wanted him and had for most of the time they had been on earth. “I’ll be okay, too.”

He raised his eyebrows in surprise and she could tell his breath was getting short. “So we’re doing this?”

Clarke laughed. “I’m not sure what exactly this is, but I guess we are.”

“Come on, it couldn’t be that bad if Indra agreed to do it. I mean, unless it involved stabbing someone.”

Clarke looked at him with horror.

“I’m sure that’s not it. Stabbing people has nothing to do with spring fertility rites.” There was a blush to his cheeks. His eyes sparkled. Clarke realize he was excited.

This was not how she had thought her first time with Bellamy would be, but she realized she was excited, too. And then she realized that she had been hoping for a first time with Bellamy for a long time now.

The third bell rang.

“Third bell. We have to go in now.”

“Anya told you what all the bells meant, but she neglected to tell you that we’d have to have sex?” Bellamy said, his voice sharp but his eyes soft as he looked at her.

“Bellamy!” she said, a moment of fear seizing her. She clutched at his soft black shirt until she remembered how ancient the fabric was, and she released her fingers, smoothing it against his chest. When she looked back up at him, he was staring at her with deep, liquid eyes.

He put one finger to her chin and tilted it up. She closed her eyes as his lips touched hers, gently, and felt stars ignite inside her. He pulled back and whispered against her lips. “I’ll take care of you,” he said. “Whatever happens in there, I won’t let anyone hurt you, okay? I just won’t. I don’t care about any allies. Trust me.”

She pulled back and looked at him. “I do trust you.” She trusted him more than anyone. “I won’t let anyone hurt you, either. You deserve to be protected, too.”

His face broke into a wide smile, then, as if she surprised him. As if no one had ever protected him before. She knew about his life on the Ark, about growing up with Octavia under the floor. It made her suddenly angry. She grabbed onto his bicep and hugged it.

“Let’s do this, Bellamy. You and me. No stupid fertility rite is going to lay us low.”

Bellamy’s eyes fell to where her breasts were heaving over the low cut bodice of her beautiful dress. Heaving, she realized. He ran his tongue over his lower lip. “We’ll see about that,” he said and she was frozen into place by a sudden attack of overwhelming lust.

“Come on. Third bell, we have to go in.” He wrapped his arm around her shoulder and led her into the dark meeting hall.

***  
The meeting house was lit with candles and decorated with flowers that she marveled at. It was still winter, really. She had no idea where they had gotten flowers. The other delegates sat in couples, some male/female, some single sex, and in one case, a trio. Plates of food and wine and sweets were set before each of them and they were instructed to follow the others in the ceremony.

Clarke was terrified that somehow the meeting would devolve into some sort of orgy, not that she wouldn’t have participated if she had to, just that she didn’t think she was ready for anything like that and really, at that moment, she just wanted Bellamy. She leaned against his side for support and he wrapped his arm around her shoulders, without once letting go.

But in the end, the ceremony was really not about sex or orgies at all. A priestess stood at the front of the hall and spoke in trigadesleng, while a priest repeated everything in English. It entailed a lot of profound words about caring for the earth and loving each other, accepting the feminine and the masculine in them all. Bellamy and Clarke copied the other delegates in their ceremonial actions. They fed each other fruits and held cups of wine to each other’s lips, looking deep into each other’s eyes. They bowed and repeated phrases while gongs chimed. There was a lot of wine.

When the priestess began speaking about the body, describing the velvet of a lover’s flesh in great detail, and Bellamy captured her eyes with his, Clarke felt her whole body heating up and urging towards his, but the ceremony continued on. He fed her wine from his glass and she fed him wine from hers and she watched him lick the drops of dark red liquid from his lips and she wanted nothing more than to chase his tongue with hers and claim his body with her own, but the ceremony continued on. Feeding and honoring and staring meaningfully into eyes while poems of bodies and earth set her blood on fire. She was about to explode.

At one point, she found herself unbuttoning his shirt as the priestess droned on in a language she didn’t understand. When the priest translated “Holy Holy are the furrows of the earth as are the furrows of your love’s body. Holy the pain and the joy. Holy the honor in which you hold your love.” Clarke looked up to find Bellamy looking down at her, his eyes dark with desire and his smile soft and fond.

“I don’t want to be here, anymore, Bellamy,” she said, her voice low and husky. “Take me back to our room.”

He caressed her cheek. She leaned into his hand.

“I think there’s an aphrodisiac in the wine, Clarke.”

Clarke ran her hand up from his chest where she had unbuttoned his shirt, to his neck, to his pulse. It fluttered against the pads of her fingers. She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, her voice soft. “I love you.”

“Clarke…” he whispered and she could hear his heart crumbling in his voice. “Don’t. You’re drunk. Or high. Or something. I don’t know what they put in this wine.”

“It’s not the wine, Bellamy. I’ve been in love with you for a while. But me telling you, yeah, maybe that’s the wine. I wouldn’t have told you without the wine.” Clarke’s heart started beating faster. Oh god. She shouldn’t have told him.

Maybe there was something in the wine, because she didn’t pull back the way she normally would have, hidden, tried to protect herself. She slid her hand down his chest to his lap, laying her fingers over him, feeling how excited he was. She sighed in relief. “Don’t worry about it. It doesn’t have to be more than just tonight. I won’t ask for more. We said it didn’t have to mean anything. I’m an adult, I can handle it. Just take me back to our cabin and we can honor the spring rites. I want to. Please?” she begged and didn’t care if she was begging.

“I don’t think I can…” his word faltered and Clarke was sure that her heart would break. She didn’t know how he could turn her down tonight. It was the rites. He had to. They had already agreed to this. She tried to pull away from him, feeling tears begin to rise in her eyes.

He grabbed her arms with two hands and pulled her against his chest. “… Don’t…” he whispered brokenly. “There’s something in the wine. I wouldn’t…” he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into his lap. “Don’t leave me,” he gasped against her neck. “I can’t make this mean nothing, Clarke.”

Clarke breathed a sigh of relief and a light filled her, like the light of the sun. She’d never felt anything of its like before. Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was Bellamy. She melted into him.

“I love you too, Clarke. Oh god, this was not supposed to happen.” His lips trailed a heated path down her neck.

“I think the goddess of the spring rites would disagree with you,” she said into his ear, smiling. She was sure there was something in the wine, but it wasn’t making her drunk. It was making her heart crack open and spill everything she felt. And everything she felt was Bellamy.

The priestess was still droning on in Trigedasleng. Clarke looked up and realized that half of the delegates had gone. The remaining were leisurely sharing the wine and fruit, laughing with each other quietly and intimately, pretty much ignoring the priests.

Bellamy’s lips slid along her collar bones. She gasped. “Bellamy,” she said. “I think the ceremony is done.”

He sat up and looked around, and then brought his heavy lidded eyes back to her. He smiled, slow and sexy and said, “come with me.”

She smiled at him, feeling pleasure rush up from her toes. “I’m counting on it.”

He took her hand and stood up, drawing her up and leading her out of the meeting house. The priestess caught her eye and smiled, but continued on, intoning the spring prayers.

Bellamy took her back to their cabin, and there he honored her body and loved her soul.

 

***  
The next morning, Clarke thought she should feel embarrassed, but when Bellamy opened his eyes and caught her watching him, all she felt was happy. He sat up in bed and pulled her close to him, so they touched everywhere, naked skin to skin.

“I can’t be cool about this, Clarke. I can’t pretend it meant nothing. I know we said it would mean nothing but it means everything. I can’t go home and go back to business as—“

Clarke cut him off with a kiss. “Everything,” she said.

He pulled back from her to look in her eyes. “So we’re… ‘treina’?”

Clarke laughed happily. “I still don’t really know what that means, but yes. We are.”

They had to start their journey back to the drop ship, but they made time to honor the spring rites once more, and then they hastily dressed and packed their ceremony clothes and headed back out into the chilly air.

At their front door, they found the Rivakru priest and priestess, waiting for them patiently, with beatific smiles upon their faces.

Bellamy startled to see them, but Clarke stepped in front of them. “Thank you for inviting us to your spring rites. We found it… profound.”

They bowed to Clarke and Bellamy. Falling to the ground on their knees, before standing up again. The priestess took each of their hands in hers and smiled at them. “Indra told us that you were not teina before this ceremony.”

Clarke lowered her eyes, suddenly embarrassed at this first acknowledgment of what was still so new.

“Thank you for honoring the goddess of the spring with your new love. There is nothing she values so much as beginnings.”

“That… is.. Not… Well.. We don’t.. That’s…” Clarke found herself stuttering.

“Clarke,” Bellamy said from behind her. He had never heard his voice so soft. She had never heard her name said so lovingly. Her heart leapt in her chest. She leaned into him. His arms came around her. “You’re welcome,” he said. “We thank you for allowing us to share in your ceremony. It was important to us, too.”

The priest and priestess gifted them with a sack of labelled seeds for the spring, saying it would bring abundance to their people. Clarke knew that Monty would love to get his hands on those and it probably would actually bring them abundance.

Before they left the village, they ran into Indra. She smirked at them, with her arms crossed, as she waited for her horse. “I trust you enjoyed the spring rites?”

Again, Bellamy stepped forward to answer. Clarke put one hand on his chest, happy that she could do that whenever she wanted to, now. She smiled up at him. The way he looked at her filled her with joy. She wasn’t ashamed of what happened last night, and she didn’t want Bellamy to think she wanted to hide it.

“Yes, Indra. We did. We learned some things we did not know.”

“I bet you did,” Indra said in her warrior’s voice that suddenly sounded like it was laughing. Indra’s mate rode up just then, leading her horse. Indra swung up into her saddle and looked down at them. “Don’t you believe that Anya is as heartless as she pretends to be. Call her ‘kippit’ for me, and see what happens.” With that, Indra and her mate rode off and Clarke and Bellamy set off in the other direction for the drop ship.

They had been walking for quite some time, in silence and he was muttering under his breath. Clarke was beginning to worry. They hadn’t really worked very much out between them, she just knew how she felt about him, and well, he’d told her he felt the same. She was about to say something about his silence when all of a sudden, Bellamy shouted.

“‘Kippit!”

Clarke jumped. “What?”

Bellamy started laughing. He grabbed Clarke and pulled her to him, kissing her and laughing again. “I was trying to figure out what Indra meant when she said ‘kippit’. Anya was a ‘kippit’.”

Clarke shook her head at him, having not one clue what he was talking about.

“Kippit,” he said. “CUPID. Say it fast. ‘Kippit.’ Anya was playing cupid. She sent us up to that spring rite on purpose. Cupid. The little Roman god of desire.”

Bellamy couldn’t stop laughing.

Clarke couldn’t help but kiss him until he finally did.


End file.
